Twin Peaks Mall anchor has signed for redeveloped center

Mall demolition, construction planned for fall 2013

LONGMONT -- A 100,000 square-foot retailer is under contract with the Twin Peaks Mall, the shopping center's owners confirmed Tuesday night to the Longmont City Council.

Allen Ginsborg of NewMark Merrill Mountain States said he couldn't release the company's identity, other than to say that it was a large-format general retailer. That's a category of business that includes warehouse club stores such as Costco or Sam's Club.

The mall's developers also plan to have a natural grocer, a 50,000 square-foot stadium-style movie theater, and a "village" of retailers and public spaces that is as much a meeting space as a shopping area.

"We plan to begin demolition and construction in the fall," Ginsborg said. "We have no reason to delay."

About 75 percent of the redeveloped mall is planned to be open in late 2014, with the rest coming in 2015.

Ginsborg said things needed to move quickly, while interest rates and competition for tenants were both low.

"We have an economy -- I wouldn't call it stable, but it's no longer unstable," he said. "It's really important that, while we have this series of opportunities that coalesce, we strike. We're not here to fail. We're here to succeed."

A redevelopment agreement is still being worked out between the city and the mall. If agreement is reached, the mall's redevelopment would be aided through a mechanism called tax-increment financing or TIFs.

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Under TIFs, bonds are issued to pay for items such as infrastructure, utilities, demolition, buying land, or other things that serve a public purpose. The city and other taxing entities would keep getting the revenue they get now, but a portion of any sales or property tax beyond that, called the "increment," would go to pay back the bonds.

In this case, the bonds would be issued by the Longmont Urban Renewal Authority -- the City Council wearing different hats -- and are expected to have $27.5 million in net proceeds. In repaying the bonds, 44 percent would come from a property tax increment, 34 percent would come from a city sales tax increment and the remaining 22 percent would come from a mill levy that the mall assesses on itself as a special district.

David Starnes, the city's redevelopment program manager, said a key element of the agreement would also be a "moral obligation" by the city to make the bonds good if revenues fall short. He added that that was unlikely given the projections; NewMark Merrill Mountain States estimates the project would generate $145 million in sales a year, or about 50 percent more than the mall's previous height.

Councilman Brian Bagley said he was ready to see this move forward.

"This plan rocks," he said. "I want to live in a town that's got this mall."

In other action:

The council voted 6-1 to cut down the proposed "health and wellness" amendments to the city's comprehensive plan before bringing them to a vote. The amendments will support infrastructure changes that support healthier living, such as making it easier to walk or bicycle through neighborhoods. But other measures were seen by many council members as unnecessary or intrusive, such as having the city offer education on growing, preparing and eating healthy food.

"I don't think we should use city resources to teach people about gardening or how important it is, because I don't think it is," Bagley said.

Councilwoman Sarah Levison voted against editing the amendments.

* The council voted 7-0 to buy two new, smaller trash trucks for alleyway collections. Tight conditions nearly led the city to end trash collections in five alleyways earlier this year, mostly in old-town Longmont; neighbors objected and some have helped to keep the alleys clear in the time since.

The trucks are estimated to cost $175,000 to $200,000 each. However, the city received a salvage credit of $573,000 from replacing some old equipment earlier this year, which city staff said could be used to buy the trucks and meet the initial maintenance costs.

Overall, 4,000 residents have alleyway pickups.

* Council members unanimously approved Map B for the new city ward boundaries. The option moves four precincts from Ward 2 to Ward 3: precinct 626, which is between Hover and Francis streets west-to-east, and Longs Peak and 11th avenues north-to-south; precincts 624 and 625, which are south of Ninth Avenue, north of Third Avenue, and between Francis and Main Streets; and precinct 629, west of Main and east of Venice Street, from Ninth Avenue north to Mountain View.

Ward 2, now with 19,983 voters, is represented by Katie Witt; Ward 3, with 20,009, is represented by Bonnie Finley.

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